The Official Joroto Blog » Tesla http://www.joroto.com/blog From the people at Joroto, Inc. Thu, 20 Oct 2011 21:10:33 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Tesla: Cool. Very Cool. http://www.joroto.com/blog/2010/01/17/tesla-cool-very-coo/ http://www.joroto.com/blog/2010/01/17/tesla-cool-very-coo/#comments Sun, 17 Jan 2010 14:56:31 +0000 John Boukis http://www.joroto.com/blog/2010/01/17/296/ Continue reading →]]> Long-Dead Inventor Nikola Tesla Is Electrifying Hip Techies

Funny I should come across the above article as Tom was just telling me about a book he just read on Tesla, about Tesla’s amazing inventions and his great understanding of how electricity works. From our discussion it sounds like Tesla had some understandings and accomplishments that have been completely lost in history.

Here is my letter to the Wall Street Journal writer of the above article. I could not let this one slip:

Daniel,

One small correction with major implications, if you haven’t heard it from overly-protective electrical geeks everywhere: Tesla would not have run electricity through his body as the article states. In such a case, even a tiny current across the heart would kill a person. What he did do was allow electricity to flow across the outside of his body. Static electricity actually sits on top of the skin. It is this property of static electricity that assures it will not harm us. A small scale example: We generate static electricity as we walk across carpet during the winter. The electricity sits on top of our skin until we touch something such as a doorknob or another person. We experience a significant shock as we transfer the electricity to them. This harmless shock amounts to thousands of volts!

Tesla was brilliant to demonstrate to average people that although electricity can be dangerous, man can completely control it and also put it to good us, such as making our hair stand up.

Some facts: God made the human body fairly insulated. We have all heard of people being struck by lightning and surviving. In such cases, the lightning flowed on the outside of the person’s body, then directly into the ground. Their skin would be burned because the electricity penetrated to some level. However to live is a great gift as lightening consists of a current that may be as large as 100,000 amps. Unlike static electricity, this current is quite dangerous as it has the power to penetrate through the body, given the right (or wrong as it may be) circumstances.

Share

]]> http://www.joroto.com/blog/2010/01/17/tesla-cool-very-coo/feed/ 2